Weekly Update

Happy Monday!

SOL Vocabulary Parade:
The Vocabulary Parade is tomorrow, January 31st.  Please send your child's Vocabulary Parade project to school on that day.  Parents are welcome to attend and watch the parade. The 1st Grade Parade is from 9:00-9:30 am in the gym at school.  

100th Day of School:

The 100th day of school is coming!  Weather permitting, we will celebrate our 100th day on Tuesday, February 7th.  I have some super cool, really fun stations planned for 100th day!  I sent home a food permission slip in today's homework folder because 2 of the stations involve food.  Please kindly sign and return the permission slip as soon as possible.  If we have any snow days before the 7th, I'll adjust our celebration to align with the 100th day.  I'll notify you if this happens.

Valentine's Day Party:Mark your calendar...our classroom Valentine's Day party will be Tuesday, February 14th from in our classroom.  All families are welcome to attend.  The kids will exchange Valentine cards at the party.  If your child brings Valentines, please be sure he/she has one for every student in the class.  If your child wants to attach a little "something" to his/her Valentine cards, please don't attach candy or food... little items like pencils, erasers, tattoos, stickers are fine.  Our Room Mom and Dad will be providing bags for your child's Valentine cards.  Please watch for more details and a food permission slip soon!

Calling All Colored Pens, Pencils, and Markers:
Are you looking for a new home for the gently used colored pens, pencils, markers, and gel pens collecting in your junk drawer? Please consider donating them to our classroom writing center.  The kids absolutely LOVE the writing center, and it's largely because of the various writing tools with which they can write.  Many of our pens and markers have begun to dry up.  I appreciate any donations you may provide to keep our writing tools stocked. 

STEAM Expo:
The annual Pinebrook STEAM Expo will be held on Friday, February 24th during our regular school day.  This day is filled with tons of fun and engaging hands-on Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Math exploration.  We need many volunteers to make the STEAM Expo a success!  Come spend the day with us! Please volunteer!

Focus Areas for the Coming Week:

• Reading:  We will explore nonfiction text features, such as tables of contents, headings, maps, diagrams, and glossaries. 
• Writing:  We will continue writing to inform as we focus on editing for mechanics, punctuation, and proper sight word spelling.
• Math:  We will begin our Geometry unit.  This is a quick little unit in which we explore shapes in the real world, and count the number of sides and vertices of various shapes.
• Social Studies:  We will continue our Famous Americans unit, in which we discuss the lives and contributions of George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, George Washington Carver, Benjamin Franklin, and Eleanor Roosevelt.

Weekly Update

Happy Sunday!
Thank you to those of you who donated glue sticks and Disinfectant wipes. We had run out of both. As you can imagine, they are going to good use. I spent my break Friday cleaning everything I could get my hands on in the classroom. I am determined to keep your kiddos and myself healthy. Winter germs are the worst!

Mid-Year Literacy Testing:
I am finishing our mid-year literacy testing, and couldn't be prouder of the progress the kids are demonstrating!  Please help this momentum continue by ensuring your child reads every day.  Please follow the guidelines on your child's homework sheet for how to discuss your child's daily reading with him/her.

SOL Vocabulary Parade:
I'm excited to see the projects the kids are creating for our SOL Vocabulary Parade on Tuesday, January 31st!  A friendly reminder to not send completed projects until that date.  Parents are welcome to attend and watch the parade. The 1st Grade Parade is from 9:00-9:30 am in the gym at school.  

Valentine's Day Party: Mark your calendar...our classroom Valentine's Day party will be Tuesday, February 14th in our classroom.  All families are welcome to attend.  The kids will exchange Valentine cards at the party, I will be sending home the class roster tomorrow for those of you wanting to get a start on those. (Shout out to the Type A peeps!)  The card exchange is completely voluntary, although historically, the majority of the class participates.  If your child brings Valentine cards, please be sure he/she has one for every student in the class. If your child wants to attach a little "something" to his/her Valentine cards, please don't attach candy or food... little items like pencils, erasers, tattoos, stickers are fine. Please watch for more details regarding the party soon!

STEAM Expo:
The annual Pinebrook STEAM Expo will be held on Friday, February 24th during our regular school day.  This day is filled with tons of fun and engaging hands-on Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Math exploration.  We need many volunteers to make the STEAM Expo a success!  Come spend the day with us! 

 Focus Areas for the Coming Week:

• Reading:  We will explore personification in stories.  Personification is when an author gives human qualities and characteristics to an animal or object. 
• Writing:  We will learn about writing to inform as we continue to focus on editing for mechanics, punctuation, and proper sight word spelling.
• Math:  We will finish our place value unit.
• Social Studies:  We will begin our Famous Americans unit, in which we discuss the lives and contributions of George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, George Washington Carver, Benjamin Franklin, and Eleanor Roosevelt.

Weekly Update

Hello Everyone! 
We have all settled back into our routine from all our recent holiday breaks. It is nice to be in the groove again. We spent a lot of time working on our New Years Resolutions and writing about our dreams after we learned about Martin Luther King Jr.
 
 
SOL Vocabulary Parade:Our SOL Vocabulary Parade will be Tuesday, January 31st.  I sent home an explanation of the parade, along with your child's vocabulary word, in last week's Thursday folder.  Please allow your child to complete this project as independently as possible.  The finished product should be an authentic representation of his/her own work.  Your child should bring the project to school on January 31st; please do no send completed projects to school before that day.  You are welcome to come watch our parade on the 31st from 9am- 9:30am in the gym.  

 Focus Areas for the Coming Week:

• Reading:  We will talk about cause and effect in stories we read.  
• Writing:  We will write "how-to" pieces (in which we teach our reader "how to" do something), while focusing on editing our writing for capital letters, punctuation, spacing, and properly spelled sight words.
• Math:  We will continue our place value unit.  We will build numbers, decompose numbers into groups of tens and ones, and write numbers in their expanded form.
• Social Studies:  We will talk about the life and contributions of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Enjoy the long weekend! Hopefully you do not have too much planned tomorrow. The weather is looking like it may be a great day to do some much needed things at home.

 

Weekly Update

Happy Sunday Everyone! I hope you enjoyed a nice relaxing weekend. I spent my days off shuttling my children to their winter sports. It was busy, unproductive but fun none the less. Sometimes it's just nice to enjoy some down time.

We had fun in math this week.  We started our Fact Families unit with a story about 3 numbers named Wee-Little 2, Cool Cat 3, and Big Daddy 5.  We had SO much fun saying "Big Daddy 5" with lots of attitude.  In fact, we're still saying it around Room 9.  Ask your kiddo about it.  (*fingers crossed* they remember!)

In other news...


Mid-Year Literacy TestingOver the next month, I will administer the mid-year Developmental Reading Assessment (DRA).  Remember, the DRA tests a student's ability to decode words, read fluently, and retell / comprehend a story.  In preparation for our mid-year testing, please ensure your child is reading each night at home.  Please use the discussion guidelines on your child's weekly homework sheet to talk about his/her nightly reading.

Vocabulary Parade:
I sent home a letter about our school-wide SOL Vocabulary Parade last week.  Please review this information, sign the slip at the bottom, detach it, and return it to school.  The parade will be Tuesday, January 31st, with a snow date of Tuesday, February 7th.  I have assigned your child a vocabulary word related to our 1st grade curriculum.  Your child should create a visual representation of this word to help convey its meaning...a poster, a t-shirt, a costume.  The sky's the limit on creativity, but your child's word must be displayed on the front of his/her project. During the parade, classes view each other's projects, and each student says his/her word.  I expect all students to participate in the vocabulary parade.  Please do not send your child's poster, t-shirt, or costume until the day of the parade.  If you have any questions, please email me.

Focus Areas for the Coming Week:

• Reading:  We will talk about point of view in stories we read.  We will answer the questions:  Who is telling the story?  A character?  A narrator?  Someone inside the story?  Or outside the story?
• Writing:  We will write stories with a beginning, middle, and end while focusing on editing our writing for capital letters, punctuation, spacing, and properly spelled sight words.
• Math:  We will finish our Fact Families unit and begin our Place Value unit.
• Social Studies:  We will continue our Economics unit.

Please let me know if you have any questions, comments, or concerns.

 

Happy New Year and Quick Update

Hi Everyone!

Happy, Happy, Happy New Year!  I have had Hot Chocolate, cookies, and too many carbs.  I have decluttered my house, played with my children, spent endless days in my workout clothes (even if I never got around to working out!),  and went to see  the Zoolights and the National Tree in DC with friends.  I suppose now  it's time to return to routines, wear pants with buttons, and cook something with vegetables.  Can I get an AMEN?  :)

This week, school will also be about reestablishing routines, reminding the kids about rules and expectations, and reconnecting as a classroom family.  
Here's the rest of your classroom news:

Mid-Year Literacy Testing:
Over the next month, I will administer the mid-year Developmental Reading Assessment (DRA).  Remember, the DRA tests a student's ability to decode words, read fluently, and retell / comprehend a story.  In preparation for our mid-year testing, please ensure your child is reading each night at home.  Please use the discussion guidelines on your child's weekly homework sheet to talk about his/her nightly reading.

No Written Homework :
We will not have new sight words this week, so there will be no written homework.  Please get back into the routine of reading every night for 20 minutes.  Please remember to record your child's reading in his/her agenda.

Focus Areas for the Coming Week:

• Reading:  We will be reviewing our good reader strategies for our mid-year literacy testing.
• Writing:  We will write about our New Year's goals and resolutions.
• Math:  We will begin our Fact Families unit.  A fact family is made up of 2 addition sentences and 2 subtraction sentences.  All 4 math facts are related (thus the term fact "family") because each fact uses the same 3 numbers.  For example, the fact family for 2, 3, and 5 looks like this:
• 2 + 3 = 5
• 3 + 2 = 5
• 5 - 2 = 3
• 5 - 3 = 2
• Social Studies:  We will begin our Economics unit.  We will discuss the differences between wants and needs, goods and services, and consumers and producers.  We will talk about the importance of saving money now for future wants and needs.

As 2017 begins, I remain thankful for the blessing of your sweet children, you, and the support you offer each day.  Please let me know how I can assist you!